Hello experts. I have an image file with 16 small jpg's (from
19k to 30k in heft). In the banner of my site, I would like to have
each of the photos appear one at a time, fade slowly in, then out,
then be replaced by the next photo in similar fashion. This is easy
enough, I know. In the simplest fashion, I could create a single
movie with, say, 500 frames, and just have the movie play front to
back, with tweens fading the pictures in and out, accordingly.

But, that movie would take time to load; and it seems kind of
pedestrian. I am looking for a different and more sophisticated
means of selecting the pictures randomly with actionscript, or
loading them externally.

Given that information, what would you do?:

Create 16 swf files with an alpha fade, in-and-out, and load
each from actionscript, individually and sequencially?
Create one swf that randomly selects a random jpg file and
place it behing an alpha fading mask?
Create a movie clip with a different jpg placed in each
frame, and have a frame randomly selected and have a alpha graphic
fade in and out above the selected frame?
Any other different idea?

I'd say it depends on how much time you have to do this. If
you need a quick turn around, I'd do it the "predestrian" way. If
you're worried about loading time, use the Bandwidth Profiler to
see how much you need to preload, and stream the rest.

If you have a lot of time, and this is something that say
needs the images to be updated regularly, maybe even dynammically,
then I'd create the external swf files and load the needed ones in
and have the next needed loading so they're ready to go when
needed.